Norwich City - An Ode to the Premiership

Article by Colin Rowe

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It all started so brightly three short seasons ago when Norwich, under the inspired leadership of Paul Lambert, climbed into the top-flight after back-to-back promotions.

We were a small club, not expected to do anything in the Premiership, especially not compared to our big spending rivals QPR, but it was the boys in Yellow who took the division by storm while the Hoops from West London struggled despite a huge transfer budget.

The first season back at the top of the footballing tree belonged to John Ruddy and Grant Holt, a campaign which saw our number 1 get an England call-up and the big number 9 only just miss out despite his 17 goals.

There were famous games in the first term, the 1-1 draw at Anfield, with Ruddy denying a certain Uruguayan at the death, a double double over Swansea and QPR, a 4-2 win against Newcastle and a 2-1 away win at White Hart Lane.

But there were bad times as well. Manchester City hammered us, twice, and in general we did not perform well against the big teams.

However, none of this mattered, we were in the top flight, punching above our weight and were never in danger of relegation finishing a vertigo inducing 12th.

Then the honeymoon ended.

Once the season was over Lambert left us for pastures new in Aston, while it looked like we might struggle to keep hold of our keeper and main goal scorer.

The man who had done the impossible, taking a team he beat 7-1 on the first day of the 2009/10 season in League One to the Premiership without missing a beat, was replaced by Chris Hughton, a man with top-flight experience who many felt was unfairly canned by Newcastle.

It then transpired Ruddy and Holt were staying put and all was set for the so-called difficult second season.

It started badly, losing 5-0 on the opening day to Fulham, a team who had just sold their only striker, but it got better quickly.

A famous 10 game unbeaten run, including victories over Arsenal and Manchester United, essentially guaranteed our Premiership status even if the second half of the season was less enjoyable.

We slipped further and further towards the drop zone with draw after draw every weekend until right at the death, when back-to-back wins over West Brom and Man City saw us leap to the heady heights of 11th.

What will I remember best about this season? A certain spring evening in West London watching our youngsters beat the billionaires youth team of Chelsea.

Having secured a third term it was time for things to change and money to be spent.

Norwich splashed the cash like we had never seen before with player after player donning the yellow and green and joining the ranks at Carrow Road.

However, this time it was not meant to be with poor result following poor result, despair from the fans over tactics and a lack of goals from our new front men.

But somehow the occasional win kept us out of trouble, but we walked the tight rope for too long and eventually lost our balance.

It was a seemingly innocuous 1-0 home loss to West Brom which eventually doomed us and resulted in Hughton being given the old heave-ho.

Was it all over? Well maybe not with Norwich alumnus Neil Adams taking the reins.

It was not to be though, with too much to do in too short a time.

So down we go to the depths of the Championship so we can play some proper football, but don’t you worry, we’ll see you in 2015/16.

On The Ball City!

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